Tu b’Shvat 5772 ט''ו בשבט

a message from Ve’ahavta

As confusing as it is to have four New Years in the Jewish calendar, the fact that only the first of Tishrei is celebrated as Rosh haShana makes it simpler for most Jews to understand. But what of Rosh haShana l’ilan, the New Year for trees on the fifteenth of Sh’vat? Or is it on the first? Since the age of trees determines certain Jewish laws pertaining to them, and since trees don’t have a birthday, a calendar date from which a tree’s age could be calculated was needed. In the same way that the Chinese celebrate all birthdays on one of the days of the Chinese New Year, trees all have their birthday on Tu b’Shvat, the fifteenth of the Hebrew month of Sh’vat. (Hillel won!)

Since agricultural laws mostly apply only in the land of Israel, Tu b’Shvat lost its place in the Jewish calendar during the first 1500 years of Diaspora life. Then in sixteenth century Tz’fat, after the expulsion of Jews from the Iberian Peninsula, the date was revived and transformed into much more than a legal point on the calendar. The mystics, poets, and Halachists of Tz’fat made the fifteenth of Sh’vat into a celebration similar to its opposing date on the other side of the calendar, the fifteenth of Av - yet another ancient festive date that had fallen into celebratory oblivion. Tu b’Shvat was turned into a festival celebrating the fruits of the land of Israel. The spiritual greats of Tz’fat composed a service for the holiday which used wine and various fruits to mark the day ritually for all time.

In the Sephardic world that Tu b’Shvat celebration born in the sixteenth century had maintained itself and formed an important link between the land of Israel and places such as Casablanca, Damascus, and Baghdad. Ashkenazim were less loyal to the ritualistic observance, but Tu b’Shvat had its place in Poland and Lithuania as well.

Suddenly, in the twentieth century, the Jewish National Fund (Keren Kayemet l’Yisrael) in using the language of the Mishna for its Hebrew name (See Mishna Pei’ah 1:1) saw the potential in the Mishna cited above for their own re-forestation objectives. If the land of Israel was once tree-covered and the Zionist dream was to plant millions of trees, why not use the New Year of the trees to involve Jews worldwide in that awesome project? Thus, Tu b’Shvat was transformed once again into yet another date of Jewish significance.

Near the end of the same century some Jews, in their concern for the global environment, started to search their own ancient values for meaning in the domain of ecology, the balance we humans must maintain with our natural world. As it happens, both our legal source material and our midrashic lore are replete with guidance in this area of concern, and we even have a calendar date that hugs trees! Once again, Tu b’Shvat took on new meanings for those Jews who read our values-heritage into their concern for the natural world. New rituals were created which celebrate God’s natural order and our ecological responsibility in that system.

What results is yet another layer of meaning for the ancient marking of this date. Aside from its early agricultural function, its mystical revival, its fundraising potential, and its environmental lessons, Tu b’Shvat is also the best illustration of how Jews across the globe and through the ages have always known how to re-interpret the past into their present to better the future.

May the almond blossoms just now blooming in Israel be visible to all of us who strive to emulate our ancestors in their interpretive flexibility.